


what a shame

by distortionist



Series: io’s persona brainrot [4]
Category: Persona 5
Genre: Character Death, Emetophobia, Hallucinations, Meta, Multi, New Game Plus, POV Second Person, idk how to describe this with tags it’s a mess, unreality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:14:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27532840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/distortionist/pseuds/distortionist
Summary: turns out cheating death is nothing more than prolonging the inevitable.
Relationships: (Minor), Akechi Goro/Okumura Haru/Persona 5 Protagonist
Series: io’s persona brainrot [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2038486
Comments: 3
Kudos: 13





	what a shame

**Author's Note:**

> hi! plz read the tags for warnings! 
> 
> i wrote this back in uhh. december of last year i think?? jeez it doesn’t feel like it was that long ago. but! i decided to go back and edit it a bit and post it here since i’ve had some writer’s block lately
> 
> the end notes will explain this fic a bit since it’s.... very weird

she is staring at you from across the room again. 

you can barely see her in the dark, but you can see her eyes and the necklace she always wears. she does not blink. she only stares. 

you have no choice but to simply stare back, knowing that if you tried to fall asleep now, you would only end up waking up from another nightmare. 

you try looking her in the eyes, and nearly end up puking. her eyes are distorted and wrong and make you feel as if you’re being ripped to shreds by her gaze alone. you decide to look at the sleeping form to your right.

haru sleeps peacefully, taking up most of the blankets and hugging her pillow tightly. her chest rises and falls with each slow breath. 

to your left, you know akira is hugging your waist, resting his head against your side. the blankets had gradually been pulled away from him over the course of the night, and he had clung onto you for warmth. 

“they know what you did,” the woman in the corner of the room speaks, and you decide to ignore her. you’ve found that engaging with her never gets you very far. “do you think they forgive you?”

you stay silent, staring at haru’s sleeping form in the dark to avoid the woman’s gaze.

“you look at her for comfort, but you’re the one who stole her father’s life.”

your breath hitches at that, but you shake your head and continue to ignore her.

“i wonder what keeps them around.” you can see her take a step towards the bed, and you close your eyes tightly. the fact that you can’t hear her footsteps as she moves assures you that she isn’t real, but you still can’t stand to look at her distorted eyes. “they know that you’re irredeemable. a worthless excuse of a person.”

when you open one eye to see where she is, you’re met with the sight of her standing at the foot of the bed. you close your eyes again, taking a deep breath to calm yourself down.

“aren’t you tired of searching for redemption?” she asks. you bite the inside of your cheek to keep yourself from letting out a sob. “you should look at your mother when she speaks to you, goro.”

you don’t end up sleeping after that.

-

when you look in the mirror the next morning, something looks wrong. out of place. somewhere in the uncanny valley, maybe. you can’t pinpoint what it is or why it looks so wrong, but before you can think about it any longer, akira steps in next to you, singing a song you only vaguely recognize as he brushes his hair. 

you try to smile at him, but when you see your own smile in the mirror, it looks even more wrong. 

you feel like you might throw up.

-

you can’t focus at work. niijima asks you why you’re acting so strange. you wave it off and tell her you’re just tired. 

the longer you stare at the missing person file, the more the picture of the victim starts to look like yourself. that’s not right. 

that’s not right that’s not right that’s not right that’s not right tha—

you put the paper back in its folder and leave for your lunch break.

-

while you’re on your way back home from work, you get a call from shido. 

several months ago, you watched shido die— and yet you still have an incoming call from him. your heart feels like it may beat right out of your chest as you stare at his contact. 

when you answer, all you hear is static. when you hang up, the static still persists. 

the woman next to you is watching the news. the reporter is talking about a missing person. 

you avoid looking at the screen.

a missing person, huh?

-

when you get home, akira tells you you look like hell. haru elbows him in the side and tells him to be kinder. he laughs softly and asks if you’re okay.

you don’t know how to respond. the longer you stare at him, trying to figure out what to say, the more blurry his face gets. you blink. your vision doesn’t get any clearer.

haru places the back of her hand on your forehead. she says something about a fever. the words don’t register. you wonder if her eyes have always been so dark.

dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark dark da

-

you are woken up in the middle of the night by a phone call. 

it’s from shido.

again.

you’re too tired to bother picking up the phone. 

haru and akira are woken by the persistent ringing. akira says it’s an unknown number. haru says to ignore the it and go back to sleep.

you wonder if you were making the entire thing up in your head all along. 

-

the missing person case is resolved the next day.

the victim was found dead in a ditch with blunt force trauma to the back of the head. 

the murderer is unidentified. niijima says something about possible suspects. you can’t hear her. too many people are speaking at once.

you think you might be getting a migraine.

the words “blunt force trauma to the back of the head” make something in your chest tighten uncomfortably. 

-

makeup isn’t sufficing to cover the dark circles around your eyes anymore. you’ve become so pale that your foundation barely matches anymore. 

when you try to brush your hair, you see a small clump fall out.

haru says it’s probably stress. akira asks if you’ve been eating properly. they both look worried.

you can’t remember if you’ve eaten recently.

your migraine still hasn’t gone away. how many days has it been? 

-

niijima asks if you’re okay. you tell her you’re tired. she says you look like a corpse.

an image of the missing person comes to mind when she says that.

a weapon hasn’t been identified. a killer hasn’t been found yet. the identity of the victim is still fuzzy.

that godawful migraine hasn’t gone away. 

-

every day feels the same.

wake up, take painkillers, go to work, murder case, niijima asks if you’re okay, get home, haru and akira ask if you’re okay, take a shower, take more painkillers, go to bed, get a phone call from the number you’ve blocked so many times, wake up, take painkillers, go to work, murder ca

-

the migraine won’t go away. you can’t remember the last time you got a full night of sleep.

you find the missing person file tacked to the wall above the bed the next time you try to sleep. 

you try to remember putting it there. you can’t.

you take it down and throw it away. 

your own face stares at you from the bottom of the trash can.

-

when you wake up, shido is on the news.

you ask akira what happened. he gives you an odd look.

shido shouldn’t be on the news.

he is not alive. you killed him.

or maybe he killed you. you can’t seem to remember the difference lately. 

when you look at the tv again, all you see is static. akira and haru seem unfazed.

-

the woman is staring at you from the corner of the room again— your mother. 

(mama?)

“your father is calling you,” she says. you glance at your phone and see shido’s contact. you’ve learned by now to silence it at night. “do you never get tired of this?”

you don’t respond. 

(you never do.)

“your body can’t take much more of this.” she smiles. you can’t tell if it’s apologetic or sadistic. “it was never meant to.”

it was never meant to. you aren’t sure what that means. 

she reaches into the trash and pulls out the missing person file. she smiles even wider as she crumples it into a ball and throws it at you.

you unfold it and stare at it for a long moment. 

there’s a photo of yourself staring back at you.

[REDACTED] AKECHI

STATUS: MISSING 

LAST SEEN IN [DATA EXPUNGED] AT [UNKNOWN] 

HEIGHT: [REDACTED]

WEIGHT: [REDACTED]

APPEARANCE: ?????????? 

(PLEASE DON’T FIND ME)

“what a shame.” you look up at her again. her dark eyes fill you with a visceral sense of dread. “the world’s favorite detective prodigy has become nothing more than a rotting corpse for the flies to eat.”

a rotting corpse.

OH GOD.

“what a shame,” she repeats. you feel nauseous. “it must have hurt when shido’s bat hit you in the back of the head.”

you feel dizzy.

your migraine still hasn’t gone away.

you want to vomit.

you aren’t sure where haru and akira went.

“what a shame.”

the words keep repeating in your head, over and over and over and over.

WHAT A SHAME.

WHAT A SHAME.

WHAT A SHAME.

WHAT A SHAME.

WHAT A SHAME. 

were akira and haru even there to begin with?

something isn’t quite right.

GAME OVER FOR THE SECOND COMING OF THE DETECTIVE PRINCE, GORO AKECHI!

**Author's Note:**

> so!! the basic explanation for... All Of That is: in the normal timeline here, akechi was murdered by shido for betraying him. but by some means akechi cheated death, except that ruined the entire meta stuff of the game, and everything glitches out before he inevitably just. died again. so you basically just got to read akechi slowly realizing that he’s a walking corpse.... fun!


End file.
